“I cannot rule out what has been written on the portal,” former Freedom Movement-turned-independent MP Mojca Šetinc Pašek commented on allegations made by Požareport that the Secretary-General of the Freedom Movement party (Gibanje Svoboda), Vesna Vuković, had accessed classified information from the National Assembly’s commissions of inquiry.
At a press conference on Monday, Mojca Šetinc Pašek explained what she had said in the part of the Delo podcast that was censored by the editor-in-chief and, therefore, did not see the light of publicity. It is now clear that the questions were about the misuse of commissions of inquiry for political purposes. MP Šetinc Pašek explained that these abuses are “potentially possible”, citing an example that “happened” to the commission of inquiry that she was in charge of until the end of November.
Namely, MP Šetinc Pašek pointed out that the Financial Administration of the Republic of Slovenia (FURS) had sent the members of the commission of inquiry in question a lot of material relating to a company which was not the subject of the commission’s investigation. She added that at one of the sessions, all the members of the commission had agreed to return the material because of the potential for misuse of data. The situation became complicated when the competent services of the National Assembly explained that it was not possible to return the material, as copies always have to remain in the National Assembly. “When I was chair of the Commission of Inquiry for determining the political responsibility of holders of public office with regard to the alleged illegal financing of political parties and party political propaganda in the media before and during the 2022 elections to the National Assembly with financial resources from state-owned enterprises, state institutions and foreign entities, I restricted access to the commission’s data, and until that moment, all members and assistants of the commission had access to the data.”
Šetinc Pašek also explained that she had mentioned on the Delo podcast that there was another commission of inquiry, created at the proposal of the Freedom Movement party, which was investigating political influence on the work of the police. According to her, it was set up for the purpose of defaming the former Minister of the Interior, Tatjana Bobnar, and the former Acting Director-General of the Police, Boštjan Lindav. “In my estimation, there is an ongoing investigation within that commission of inquiry. Whether those were the reasons for the censorship, I don’t know.” In addition, MP Šetinc Pašek said that what Požareport recently reported on goes beyond her knowledge, and she declined to comment on it. She then added, “I cannot rule out what has been written on this portal.”
What did Požareport write?
On Monday, the Požareport web portal published a high-profile story headlined “The Watergate of Golob’s Freedom Movement. When Mojca Šetinc Pašek confirms: Vesna Vuković accesses classified Financial Administration data. Who are the people involved?” The article states that Mojca Šetinc Pašek, in the censored part of the Delo podcast, probably said something that incriminates Robert Golob‘s inner circle, and therefore, it was not allowed to be published.
Šetinc Pašek said that Vesna Vuković, the Secretary-General of the Freedom Movement party, had illegally accessed a whole range of secret or confidential information from the Financial Administration of the Republic of Slovenia, on specific people and companies through the commission of inquiry that has been researching controversial party financing. This is the first time that rumours of abuse have been officially confirmed. She did not only look at the Financial Administration’s data, though, but also that of the police and the Office for Money Laundering Prevention. The web portal also reported that the commission of inquiry in question obtained information from the Financial Administration in agreement with its director, Peter Grum (a Freedom Movement party cadre), and they obtained data from several years ago, which constitutes a serious abuse of the investigative commission of the National Assembly.
And through the Office for Money Laundering Prevention, Vuković allegedly managed to obtain, within hours of the transaction, secret information that the seller of the infamous court building on Litijska Street, Sebastjan Vežnaver, had returned part of the purchase price as “loan repayment”. This is strictly confidential information, which, according to other sources, is practically impossible to obtain legally, and all of this was published by her “former” investigative web portal Necenzurirano (Uncensored).
Will the criminal investigators go into action?
All of this is seriously incriminating for Vesna Vuković, her boss Robert Golob and the Freedom Movement party. The least the law enforcement authorities should do is question all the actors involved and initiate criminal proceedings.
C. Š.
